I've stayed away from this thread but I'm getting wound up.
kuningan - I think you'll find that Ryan and Easy have much larger catchment areas on the other ends of any routes they may wish to operate into the island full of purple rinsers who might want to return to their holiday isle of old. Any new route from the island is a bonus for the islanders!
But on the whole I feel sorry for flybe getting negative press all the time. Even today in the press there was a letter saying that the only reason the airline wanted a runway improvement/extension was so they could help out Jersey whenever thier plane goes tech. I'm sure that Guern residents don't mind if a Jersey plane comes through to pick them up if their planes are tech! And I'm sure they'd appreciate a shiny new jet being on the Gatwick route.
As for Malcolm Hart's continual comments. The man is unbelievable! Where does he get off?! "Why should flybe get any money from the States because their jet will not be able to fly full from here?" Not a direct quote, I'm paraphrasing, but the same reason as to why Aurigny should be States owned if they are supposedly turning a profit!! If they're doing so well, why don't they move on from any State's funding etc. I'd be delighted to see local people's taxes go towards the essential runway work and not providing a complimentary Press and soft drink to punters. When will they realise that's not the way a COMPANY works?!! As for them blaming flybe for a loss of SOU route, well, if a Blue Islands flight left with 1 passenger the other night compared to a few more on the flybe plane, where do they think these mystical locals are going to turn up from? People are hardly queuing up for the long trip via ALD, be it via, through or direct! Whatever the phraseology, you only need to ask the poor Bristol pax (we all know it's happened more than once!) what they think about an extended trip on a tri. And I love that plane! But Malcolm blames flybe for the loss of the "new" SOU route because of their (flybe's) lack of commitment on the MAN route. They must hve reasons for dropping it. I don't understand it cos they were pretty busy when I used them in early Jan! But as for his comments about not being able to reinstate an extra flight pet day because it's not financially viable, well something's not right! Aurigny have a monopoly with 2 flights a day!! Don't let "your" islanders down!
The expensive ads in last year's Flight for a few weeks.... the only airlines who submitted a new route were Aer Arran and Eastern Airlines! Ask the public- nobody knows who they are, and I wouldn't gamble my favourite pencil on them keeping a route longer than a year.
The runway needs to be sorted. It's appalling that the island has let this situation get out of hand. There is NO money in the State's purse to pay for this, BUT IT MUST BE DONE. Stop handing out the Press on flights for a start.
Rant over, but there may be more! Sorry if my random comments has tainted this thread, but it is entitled "Guernsey".